Book of Mages 3 suggestions

The newly released Book of Mages: The Dark Times is an excellent game, 100 times better than its predecessor (Book of Mages: The Chaotic Period). However, the game still has much room for improvement. I hope the author will eventually make a third installment, and in this thread you can post the things you would like to see in Book of Mages 3.

No spamming, flaming, and trolling in this thread, please. I know that the game is released not long ago, and I’m not immediately demanding a new sequel. I just want to point out a few things that could make the game even better.

To start this off, I’ll post some of my own suggestions.

First, I’ll point out some problems I had with Book of Mages: The Dark Times.

Fix the grammar mistakes. Though the grammar mistakes in Book of Mages 2 were not as frequent as the first one, they still exist. The game itself is good, but the grammar mistakes look like an ugly scar on an otherwise perfect face.

Better plot and characterization. The game is good, but story-wise the plot is very poorly done IMO. The game made no attempts to give distinct personalities to its characters. And there were plot holes, too: if you befriend a character and make a good relationship with him, he does not even recognize you when you next see him; the Black Robe mage Hawklight was a spy sent by the White Robes, but in the final battle he still fought on the Black side; Treefire, leader of Dark Wood, was manipulated by the Black Robes via poison, and he drank the antidote and told me that he no longer wished to be controlled, but in the final battle he still fought on the Black side. It would be nice to have a good story to match the game.

More unique battles. After you’ve progressed far into the game, and established a set strategy for your mage, the battles become a bit monotonous. The same strategy works on almost all opponents, and you hardly ever have to think to beat a certain enemy. In the new game, I hope that the battles can be a bit more unique, requiring different strategies to beat each new enemy.

Second, I’ll post some things I’d like to see in Book of Mages 3.

Bring back the clan icons. In Book of Mages 1, the six clans all had their unique icons (e.g. Ice Land was a pair of white spears, while Chaos Desert was three red circles). It would be nice to have those icons back. I have suggestions for some new icons:
- Chaos Desert: Three yellow fireballs.
- Burning Hill: A volcano about to erupt.
- Dark Wood: A black tree burning with blood red flames.
- Ice Land: Six ice shards arranged in a snowflake pattern.
- Great Sea: A vortex of sea water.
- Poison Water: A green skull (can’t think of anything better).

More item types. I hope that in the new game, you can equip items like in a classical RPG. You should be able to equip a Robe, a Weapon, an Orb, and two pieces of Jewelry. Maybe you can have equipment shops, and obtain certain special items from quests.

New battle mechanics. We should try to make the battles more unique and less monotonous. I don’t have much on my mind right now, but I do have one suggestion: Melee Attack. Mages aren’t necessarily squishy wimps; they can attack enemies physically with their weapons. Melee attack does not consume mana, and its damage is equal to the Power of your equipped Weapon multiplied by your Basic Damage.- Melee Attack VS Attack Bolts or Defense Bolts: You take full damage from enemy bolts, including defense bolts. Enemy takes full damage from your attack.
- Melee Attack VS Melee Attack or Melee Defense: The combatant with lower Melee Power takes damage.
- Melee Defense VS Attack Bolts: Subtract your Melee Power from your total damage taken. No, this cannot heal you.
Melee Attack and Defense can be combined with magic. For example, you can use magic to boost your Melee Power, or you can summon bolts when you use Melee Attack for extra damage.

Gender variance. In Book of Mages 2, all characters are either genderless or male. To make the game more realistic, I think it should have both male and female characters. You should be able to change the gender of your own character, and there should be male and female versions of the Robe you wear.

Possibility to learn magic from multiple clans. It would certainly be cool if you’re able to learn magic from more than one clan. You can specialize in one clan, or learn a little bit from all the clans. I’ve already thought of a new background story driven by this, and I’ll post that later.

I was bored last night, so I thought of a new plot that could go along with Book of Mages 3. The background focuses on the story of Frostburn, an exceptionally talent young mage that was exiled from his clans for learning the magic of other clans.

Year 221, the Black Robes were defeated and disbanded by the White Robes. Shiverhorror of Ice Land was elected as the new Great Mage. To prevent another war from happening, the Great Mage formed a non-clan organization called the Order of Arcanum, dedicated to maintaining the peace among clans.

Year 223, Frostburn of Ice Land was sent to the Young Mage contest, representing his clan. He made friends with Shatterflame, the young mage from Chaos Desert. Shatterflame showed Frostburn some of his Fire magic, and Frostburn miraculously found that he could learn Fire magic with ease. The two young mages did not know that learning magic from clans other than their own was forbidden, and Shatterflame continued to teach Frostburn until Frostburn completely mastered Chaos Desert magic.
In the Contest, Frostburn easily defeated his final opponent by using Ice Land and Chaos Desert magic together. However, he was seen by his Clan Master and Great Mage, Shiverhorror. Frostburn was branded as a cheater, and he was exiled from his clan.

Year 224, Frostburn wandered aimlessly in Dark Alleys and the Wilderness, slowly driven to madness by anger, hate, sadness, and despair. He hated Shiverhorror for exiling him, and he swore to kill the Great Mage and take his title.
Frostburn traveled to other clans, seeking powerful rogue mages who would illegally teach him their clan magic. Soon, he mastered the magic of all six clans, and became nigh invincible. Frostburn even found two ancient arcane tomes, written by the two original mages who first learned how to control Fire and Water. With the two tomes, and magic gained from all six clans, Frostburn was able to combine Fire and Water to create a third element, Lightning, that controlled the power of nature itself.
With his newfound power, Frostburn began to have delusions of grandeur. He started calling himself the Awakened One, and believed himself to be destined to rule the world as the Great Mage. Frostburn began to recruit powerful rogue mages, creating an organization called the Cult of Ataxia, with the sole purpose of overthrowing the Great Mage.

Year 240, the game begins. In the past 16 years, Frostburn was able to amass an army of fanatics who believed him to be the new messiah of mages, because he could use both Fire and Water. Shiverhorror, the Great Mage, had grown old and not as powerful as before. A violent revolution was at hand, and the world of mages was about to be changed forever.
You play the role of a talented young mage, who also has the gift of mastering both Fire and Water. When the game starts, you do not have to choose one of the six clans. Rather, you can travel to different clans and learn different magic. You must be careful, though. If you decide to learn magic from more than one clan, you must keep your secret; if you are found out, you’ll be exiled from your clan just like Frostburn. You can join the Cult of Ataxia and follow their quest for world domination, or you can join the Order of Arcanum and thwart Frostburn’s sinister scheme. Or you can simply stay neutral, and watch the world as it changes before your very eyes.

That’s it for now. If you have ideas that can make the next Book of Mages game better, please post them here.

Better plot and characterization. The game is good, but story-wise the plot is very poorly done IMO.

The plot of the game is quite good, and even though it’s quite familiar and quite short, what more do you expect from an average game? Regardless, the changeable endings of the game, in my opinion, easily make up for the simplicity of the plot.

The game made no attempts to give distinct personalities to its characters. And there were plot holes, too: if you befriend a character and make a good relationship with him, he does not even recognize you when you next see him;

And orly? I happened to notice the messenger being ambitious; the briber (Dragonbane for instance) basically being both enthusiastic for the White Robes to win but reluctant to cheat in the contest; the hermit in the Wilderness of Ice Land later in the game being ill-tempered but appreciative of a bit of attention; Battlebeard himself having selfish intentions and being sick of being controlled by the Black Robes, etc., etc. Not to mention your own character can go anywhere from a Paladin look-alike, to an insane, paranoid mass-murderer. Just one or two personalities for you.

the Black Robe mage Hawklight was a spy sent by the White Robes, but in the final battle he still fought on the Black side; Treefire, leader of Dark Wood, was manipulated by the Black Robes via poison, and he drank the antidote and told me that he no longer wished to be controlled, but in the final battle he still fought on the Black side. It would be nice to have a good story to match the game.

Hawklight still fights on the bad guys’ side because he’s controlled by the poison. That much is obvious.

Treefire is pretty selfish, and he’s been offered the title of Great Mage. Connect the dots.

More unique battles. After you’ve progressed far into the game, and established a set strategy for your mage, the battles become a bit monotonous. The same strategy works on almost all opponents, and you hardly ever have to think to beat a certain enemy. In the new game, I hope that the battles can be a bit more unique, requiring different strategies to beat each new enemy.

Challenge yourself. Be an independant gamer. Don’t learn your favourite skill one time, and see how well you can do without it. Hmm, that’ll made those last battles hard, won’t it?

Aside from this, I do hope to see more skills/skill upgrades in the sequel (which I should take a moment to point out Nob Studio is intending to make).

More item types. I hope that in the new game, you can equip or consume items like in a classical RPG. You should be able to equip a Robe, a Weapon, an Orb, and two pieces of Jewelry. And maybe there could be potions you can use in battle to heal yourself, and a bunch of other things. Maybe we can add a currency system, and have item shops.

This is going very quickly towards typical RPG indeed.. I like the idea in this one that usually, doing bad things will get you shiny items, but doing good things will get you more skill points (knowledge). Plus, the ability to get all, or even many titles in the game, goes completely against the idea of BoM’s alterable pathways.

I won’t address your next point as much, because past my suggestions above I agree extra attacks would be a good idea. However, I’ll risk sounding spoilt and say I don’t like the idea of a melee attack for BoM.

Gender variance. In Book of Mages 2, all characters are either genderless or male. To make the game more realistic, I think it should have both male and female characters. You should be able to change the gender of your own character, and there should be male and female versions of the Robe you wear.

Waste of time. I for one wish this never existed in games, it gets way too much attention. And sorry, please tell me the benefit of bothering to change characters’ genders? Seriously, newer games are substituting gender changing and eventual relationships for actually having half-decent plots.

And your last post has pretty much killed the idea of BoM, I’ll wait to see your plot idea. :\

- I believe, having a Great Mage from Ice Land, that they would go to Ice Land for the Young Mage Tourney.
- Obviously they’d be kicked out of their clans for learning other clans’ magic. But by the time your character comes around, that’s totally fine? Huh.
- “you are the only one who can defeat Frostburn”? Screw being Dragonblade and Sirensong’s offspring, I think leaving the changeable plot is a lot better. This is far too…prophecised.

And the idea it generally sounds like a soap-opera-esque revenge. To risk sounding spoilt again, I don’t like it.

That plot doesn’t really matter. I was just looking for excuses for the player character to be able to use the spells of all the clans. And I do think that the final boss should be able to use both fire and water. If you don’t like that, I suppose I can’t do anything about it.

The most prominent example is in the final battle, none of the Black Robe people I befriended earlier recognized me. I saved Treefire from poison, and he ambushed me in the final battle like he never met me before.

Hawklight still fights on the bad guys’ side because he’s controlled by the poison. That much is obvious.

Remember the antidotes? And who knows, maybe Hawklight isn’t poisoned, since he’s a spy and all.

Treefire is pretty selfish, and he’s been offered the title of Great Mage. Connect the dots.

He said he’s tired of being controlled. He shouldn’t be fighting under the Black Robes, because he was probably forced to join by Corpsedusk in the first place.

He said he’s tired of being controlled. He shouldn’t be fighting under the Black Robes, because he was probably forced to join by Corpsedusk in the first place.

The most prominent example is in the final battle, none of the Black Robe people I befriended earlier recognized me. I saved Treefire from poison, and he ambushed me in the final battle like he never met me before.

Are you sure that was Treefire? Sounds like what Battlebeard said to me… I may need to play through the Black Robe path again.

Remember the antidotes? And who knows, maybe Hawklight isn’t poisoned, since he’s a spy and all.

If you fail to retrieve the antidote, he is killed.

It’s not difficulty I’m asking, it’s variance. The enemies look more or less the same to me; the battles are too similar.

Sorry, my mistake:

More unique battles. After you’ve progressed far into the game, and established a set strategy for your mage, the battles become a bit monotonous. The same strategy works on almost all opponents, and you hardly ever have to think to beat a certain enemy. In the new game, I hope that the battles can be a bit more unique, requiring different strategies to beat each new enemy.

That sounded a lot like you wanted difficulty, and requiring different strategies to beat each new enemy, to me.

Are you sure that was Treefire? Sounds like what Battlebeard said to me… I may need to play through the Black Robe path again.

I was a Burning Hill White Robe, and Treefire came to me after I got the antidotes. I’m sure it was Treefire.

If you fail to retrieve the antidote, he is killed.

Wait, was he killed by poison? That happened in my first playthrough, but I don’t remember. Anyways, I succeeded in retrieving the antidote, so it would only make sense that the poison inside Hawklight is cured.

That sounded a lot like you wanted difficulty, and requiring different strategies to beat each new enemy, to me.

I said the battles were monotonous. They were a bit too easy, but that’s not the main point. IMO an RPG should have a variety of enemy types to fight against.

- Obviously they’d be kicked out of their clans for learning other clans’ magic. But by the time your character comes around, that’s totally fine? Huh.

I guess I didn’t make that clear. All right, I’ll explain what I had in mind.

It is never allowed to learn magic from clans other than your own. For example, if you’re start with Chaos Desert, and you want to learn Poison Water magic, the Magic Master will refuse to teach you.
To learn magic from another clan, you must take off your equipped Chaos Desert Robe, and find a special item that can “mask” the Chaos Desert magical aura that you exude. After doing so, the Magic Master of Poison Water will no longer think that you’re from Chaos Desert.
If anyone finds out that you’ve learned magic from more than one clan, the news will travel to your Clan Leader in a few months, and you’d get called back to your clan and get exiled. If you have the “Exiled” title, no Magic Master will agree to teach you any more magic; you’ll have to find rogue mages in Dark Alleys and Wilderness to teach you. If you do bad things after getting exiled, you’ll become a Criminal; if you do good things, you’ll become a Vigilante.
If you do not want to get exiled, you must make sure no one finds out. For example, you should not wear Poison Water Robe in Chaos Desert, and you should not wear Chaos Desert Robe in Poison Water. If you fight someone in Dark Alleys or Wilderness, and you use magic from both clans, you must kill your opponent to keep him quiet; if you use multiple clan magic to save someone, then that person will keep your secret. If you fight someone in public and use magic from both clans, then someone will definitely report it to your Clan Master.
Generally, it is very hard to not get exiled if you learn from more than one clan; one mistake, and you’re finished. However, you can still join the White Robes or Black Robes if you’re exiled, since the Robes are non-clan organizations. Keep in mind that being exiled does not make you a criminal; it simply prevents you from legitimately learning magic from clans. After being exiled, you no longer belong to any clan; with the example, you would go from XXX of Chaos Desert to XXX the Exiled.
There could be several paths: sticking with one clan, learn from multiple clans but never get caught, get caught and exiled, or never join any clan at all. If you choose not to join any clans, you can go around looking for rogue mages or arcane tomes to learn magic. For example, a rogue mage may say, “retrieve this item for me, and I’ll teach you this spell”.

I know, this is very complicated. But it certainly adds depth to the game, doesn’t it?

Oh yeah, one thing I forgot to add:

Fights involving more than two mages. It would be pretty hard to code, but it would be cool if not all battles are 1v1. When facing multiple opponents, you can spread your bolts over all the enemies. Of course, the Melee Attack in my suggestion can only hit one target… unless there is some kind of special magic, of course.

Depth? It over-complicates it, for an idea that is not only sub-par in the first place, but defeats the idea of the games… Your allegiance to your clan is not supposed to matter as much as your allegiance to good or evil. :l

Two or more mages again, not only defeats the idea of the games, but is probably a lot to program. That said, it would be the most interesting to see out of your suggestions so far.

If you do not want to get exiled, you must make sure no one finds out. For example, you should not wear Poison Water Robe in Chaos Desert, and you should not wear Chaos Desert Robe in Poison Water.

Look at it this way. You’re a mage of Chaos Desert. You pretend to be a Poison Water mage in order to learn their magic. Now, what would your Chaos Desert Magic Master think if he sees you in Poison Water clothing?

I guess you’re the “conservative” type of people who don’t like big changes to their favorite game. Keep in mind that while you may think my ideas are bad, they aren’t objectively bad; everything you stated are opinions, not facts, so I would advise you to use a less presumptuous tone.

I personally would like to second the grammar part, and I’m sure none of us would refuse to lend a hand to Nob Studios concerning that.

I would also agree about the monotony of battles concerning Chaos Desert at least. By round 3 or 4 my opponent was usually dead due to way too many bolts with special denial and burning. Since none of my opponents had health over 500 anyway, with the exception of the hermit I’d just unload on them with all additional bolts and whatnot and they’d end up doing around 1000 damage combined. Have yet to try other clans but I’ll give it a shot now. I doubt the experience will differ greatly however in the fighting department.

I personally think consumables and equippable items would lessen my enjoyment really. I like the game style as it is and I find items to be a very unneeded addition really. I’d rather not go out of my way to find items, make cash somehow and buy more items. I personally think they should remove items altogether since they provide an unnecessary contrivance.

What I would very much like to see is some sort of multiplayer component. Would be extremely nice to get to battle you two on Kong.

I’d have to disagree with the “challenge yourself” bit Emanresu. I shouldn’t have to impose arbitrary limits to my gameplay experience in order for it to be hard. This only serves to give you a false impression of difficulty when in fact you just chose to cripple yourself. The game should still be able to serve you some extremely difficult encounters by itself. That being said however, since this is mostly a turn-based game and due to the fact that the way you build your mage early on makes you or breaks you, kinda puts a large dent in that since there is little to no skill involved in the actual fighting part.

As I’m sure you guys know, being on the ball with leveling and skills/spells will always make you zoom through enemies regardless of how difficult they are, since their difficulty is adjusted for specific levels. There’s a video on youtube for instance showing how people managed to one-shot the last Final Fantasy 6 boss with their first character in the party, considering you fight him with 12 characters at that point.

The gender variance thing is a bit of a neutral point really for me. I couldn’t care less if they added girl mages since I’d still choose a guy mage since that’s what I am.

What I would really love to see is balancing the “skill point gain”. I’d really not want to be penalized early on in the skill point department for choosing to be a goody two shoes. For instance I died some very asinine things in my second playthrough. I defeated Oldhealer because that gave me a whooping 9 skill points, whereas if I had gone with my personally preferred choice of thanking him, I’d have only gotten 7. I even begged Corruptor to teach me because that gave me 10 skill points. Whereas threatening him would have only gotten me an assassin’s ring which and 2/3 skill points in the long run.
So to summarize, I’d love it if, regardless of what path you choose as a mage, be it neutral, good or bad, you’d still get the same skill points overall and that would balance you out quite nicely, especially if a multiplayer component is to be considered.

Just a minor thing here but I would love it if, when it comes to climbing the ranks in your clan, that you be awarded a different character appearance instead of unlocking all of them after the first playthrough and starting a new game as a Clan Leader-clothed lvl 1 newb. Alternatively, reaching certain milestones could unlock a cloth type for your character to wear that could be changed in-game whenever you wanted. Simply a minor aesthetic preference.

About the gender variance, of course I would choose a male character, since I’m male. However, mages are humans; humans need to have two genders to reproduce and survive. Not having any female characters at all in a fictional world is simply unrealistic, and it might even appear sexist to some people. This, as well as the grammar, should not be top priority, but I think the game would be better with it than without.

Well I never implied those two points to be top priority, just saying it wouldn’t hurt the game, you know.

However I’d like to point you to your statement “Not having any female characters at all in a fictional world is simply unrealistic.” Notice the fictional/unrealistic bit. I wouldn’t call it too much of a stretch to not have females since, in theory, in fiction you can stretch it without limit anyway. Also, nothing in Book of Mages 1/2 specifies Mages to be human. They may look like us and we would certainly be justified in assuming that, considering we’re humans and all, but we shouldn’t necessarily assume we know the designer’s intentions.

They may very well be an asexual race, quite similar to ours, but who reproduce using some sort of magnetic field manipulation in order to influence the growth of a specific type of rock, which in turn would crack open to reveal a fully grown teenager. Sounds retarded? Quite so. Would it work? With some more detailed explaining, sure. Is it fiction? You betcha.

Sorry, I like to nitpick.

edit: I’m not arguing for or against gender variance mind you, I simply don’t care if they do add it. While I’m sure many people would care if they did, I myself am neutral. As for the sexism, it’s their game, and what they decide goes really. Plus, it’s fictional :P

edit #2: I just realized something. I remember playing Diablo 2 and being bothered about how there was no male Sorcerer or Assassin and wishing they’d do that. Does that make me a hypocrite? Or would I have to be against gender variance in BoM 3 to be qualified as one?

Frankly, I don’t really care about gender variance either, or even grammar. I’d rather have new game mechanics. I don’t want BoM3 to be an “unoriginal sequel” that so many people seem to hate.

BTW, I’m going to change the plot I have on the first post a bit. I’ll make it less soap-opera-ish, and I’ll change Frostburn from someone who’s simply jealous and hurt to an insane maniac who wants to take over the world because of his delusions of grandeur. After all, he has enough reasons to believe so, since he’s the only mage (beside the player) who can control both fire and water. And Dragonblade and Sirensong will no longer be the leaders of the White Robes, since it’d be best if the player starts neutral.

I have a question though. Should they keep the White Robes and Black Robes in BoM3? You know, in BoM2 the Black Robes were disbanded, and the sole reason of the White Robes’ existence is to disband the Black Robes. Should we have two different opposing organizations in BoM3?

About the gender variance, of course I would choose a male character, since I’m male. However, mages are humans; humans need to have two genders to reproduce and survive. Not having any female characters at all in a fictional world is simply unrealistic, and it might even appear sexist to some people. This, as well as the grammar, should not be top priority, but I think the game would be better with it than without.

I’ll post some more ideas tomorrow.

I hope you realise you “join” clans, (as stated in both BoM games) and you are not born into them. Clearly there could be some manner of reproduction happening outside of them.

And the Black Robes aren’t always disbanded. In some endings, the White Robes were disbanded. I believe for the sequel, it should be assumed that both Black Robes and White Robes were disbanded, and that Shiverhorror is the new Great Mage. If your plot intends to keep Frostburn as the antagonist, I would personally make his disciples those who have been shown a future of grandeur, and who believe themselves worthy of ruling the world (not realising of course that Frostburn doesn’t actually care for them). In opposition to him, you could be even cooler and have someone who intends to become the Great Mage themselves.

I’m glad you approve. Meh, I suppose I can get rid of Dragonblade and Sirensong altogether, since Frostburn was only an Ice Land mage, and he could use both Fire and Water. I’m gonna edit now.

I believe for the sequel, it should be assumed that both Black Robes and White Robes were disbanded,

I need to think of an organization name then.Order of Arcanum: Formed by the Great Mage, Shiverhorror. A non-clan organization dedicated to maintaining peace among the six clans.Cult of Ataxia: Formed by Frostburn, the Awakened One. A secret organization of powerful rogue mages bent on world domination.

Exactly. Otherwise my version of the plot wouldn’t work, since you can join one clan first then secretly join another one.

I think you’d want to put more emphasis, then, on any mage’s right to walk around as they see fit.
Also, I was saying the necessity for female mages is null.

I need to think of an organization name then.
Order of Arcanum: Formed by the Great Mage, Shiverhorror. A non-clan organization dedicated to maintaining peace among the six clans.
Cult of Ataxia: Formed by Frostburn, the Awakened One. A secret organization of powerful rogue mages bent on world domination.

Names are a little too much, I think. Compare to “Black Robes” and “White Robes”/good and evil from BoM2 and BoM1 respectively.

I liked the first one,where each clan had a different maximum level of spells.
Also,maybe 9 clans,i’ve thought of 3 more

Earth:
Sharp Mountain[Specializes in making a un-blockable move,that does x damage,x being the level +3]
Jagged Cliff[Specializes in blocking and defense bolts]
[i’ll edit this one in soon,i was supposed to be in bed an hour ago…]

New elements? Um… I don’t think that would work. The story of BoM3 should be a continuation of BoM2, so you can’t have three new clans randomly popping out of nowhere. I only gave Frostburn the new Lightning element because he was able to obtain it through the fusion of Fire and Water.

I.e.: Your magical bolts lower the target’s damage by X for each hit (Dark Wood) and place an effect that reduces life (Poison Water) and mana (Great Sea) by X each round and also increase the damage of subsequent bolts by X (Burning Hill). Additionally, each bolt that connects adds its total damage to next bolt (Chaos Fire). Stacks up to X. At 20 stacks, enables the usage of Instant-kill Clan Special (Poison Water, Ice Land).

Obviously I never intended for it to be balanced in any way, only threw that out as a proof of concept.

As for your question, if we’re talking purely cosmetic, I assume the easiest way would be to use the color of the clan you originally started as. Either that or depending on how many bolt types you learn and combine, they could be combined chroma, like say yellow bolts for great sea + burning hill.

If you’re talking about creating a fighting style for different combinations of clan specials then we have to factor in every possible spell, including the basic L/H bolts. And that’s not factoring in the fact that we’re still thinking about how we’d adapt the current BoM 2 fighting system to these changes and not about a new system altogether.

However, if indeed we’ll just be using a modded BoM 2 fighting system then one possibility is indeed the proof of concept I posted above. For instance, you start out as Great Sea and your bolts drain mana and then you go learn stuff from Poison Water and your bolts also drain life. Do this enough times and your bolts would have all clan effects. Either that or you could learn all clan special effects but when firing your bolts you’d only be limited to picking one enhancement.

Then there’s also the true combination in which you learn two clan bolt enhancing specials and you get neither but instead a whole new effect altogether.

I’m trying to think of an entirely new battle system for BoM3. In the current one, the defense bolts are not as useful as they should be, since you can use attack bolts to counter your opponent’s bolts. The new battle system is as follows:

You can only use defense bolts to intercept your opponent’s attack bolts. If you have any defense bolts remaining after all nullifying all of your opponent’s attack bolts, then those remaining bolts are absorbed back into your body, and you regain the mana used to cast them.
You cannot summon attack bolts while defending, nor can you summon defense bolts while attacking.

When your attack bolt A and opponent’s defense bolt D collide, three things may happen:
- If the power of A is twice of D or greater, then D will be destroyed, and A will hit the opponent and deal damage equal to A-D. This is called piercing damage.
- If the powers of A and D are fairly close to each other, then both bolts are destroyed.
- If the power of A is half of D or less, then A will be destroyed, and the opponent will regain half the mana used to cast D.

And I want to change the fighting styles of the clans a bit. Not that I’m complaining, but I think I have ways to make the clans more unique and different from one another compared to what they are now.Chaos Desert (yellow): Overwhelm opponents with sheer number of bolts. Can use own life as fuel to summon more bolts.Burning Hill (red): Use mana to increase attacking power. Prefer to hit hard rather than hit fast.Dark Wood (purple): Use opponent’s strength against him by leeching his life, mana, special, and converting his bolts into your own.Great Sea (blue): Good at defense and healing. Can regenerate life, mana, and nullify damage. Very high survivability.Ice Land (cyan): Specializing in slowing down and disabling opponent. Can freeze him, lower his power, and deplete his mana and special.Poison Water (green): Use poison to kill opponent slowly. Can reduce opponent’s max life, as well as use poison to induce other nasty effects.
I made Burning Hill and Chaos Desert a bit more different: Burning Hill is now very mana-heavy, while Chaos Desert uses life to make more fireballs. Dark Wood never really stood out to me, so I gave it the ability to leech life and mana. IMO the Mana Leak ability is more fitting in Ice Land, since it slows down your opponent; I gave Great Sea healing abilities to compensate. Poison Water remained somewhat unchanged.

As for the bolt mixing from multiple clans, I’ve thought of a solution.
- If a bolt only contains magic from one clan, then it looks normal.
- If a bolts contains magic from more than one clan, then its appearance depends on its components:
– If the bolt contains only Fire, then its color is orange and red. (e.g. Burning Hill + Dark Wood)
– If the bolt contains only Water, then its color is sky blue. (e.g. Great Sea + Poison Water)
– If the bolt contains more Fire than Water, then it is red with a tint of blue. (e.g. Chaos Desert + Dark Wood + Poison Water)
– If the bolt contains equal amounts of Fire and Water, then its color is violet. (e.g. Burning Hill + Chaos Desert + Great Sea + Ice Land)
– If the bolt contains more Water than Fire, then it is blue with a tint of red. (e.g. Great Sea + Ice Land + Poison Water + Dark Wood + Chaos Desert)
– If the bolt contains magic from all six clans, then it has a psychedelic rainbow hue.

i like the ways you tweaked the clan fighting styles
but i think if you really want to have mix-matching of different clan abilities then say if a mage has one bolt effect then they can’t get another one
same with other abilities, imagine a mage with silence(darkwood), paralyze(poisonwater), freeze defend(iceland) and mana leaking bolts(greatsea)
they would just be too powerful
so i think clan specials should be leveled and a mage can only get one special from each level

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